Hello everyone! I collected alot of information from the best orc player in the game currently; svulnar, the wiki, the dev team, and my own personal experience, and now it is compiled in an easy to find guide! I promise to update it Weekly and if you have any info you want added/changed please either post in this thread or pm me and i promise to give you credit for your contribution!

Introduction to Orcs:

Orcs are an interesting race option, and often require more strategy then the other 2 races to prosper in fights, In this guide I will attempt to teach you some tactics for military units, show you all the options you have to build your economy, and the most efficient way to setup your town. I will also list off some major differences between orcs and other races:

Orcs:
-Are the only race without trickle units, we have to rely almost entirely on laborers, or on purchased human/elven units.
-Have a resource cap of 200k+ (The highest cap reached so far was 213650) more than double the other races. Though due to the recent change limiting the total number of buildings built, The new cap will probably be much lower.
-Are similar to protoss style gameplay, all of our units serve a specific purpose ment for killing specific things and the difference between victory and defeat is strategy (see military tab).
-Are the only race (currently) that have the option to free build, placing buildings wherever they desire, Though Patch #22 has now limited the total number of buildings built to 160.
-Train almost all of their units by converting Laborers in specific buildings (see Infrastructure).
-Can speed up their building times by tasking more workers to the building.
-Are the only race that cannot build stone walls.
-Have a base resource cap of 8500 that can be expanded by building ANY building.

Economy: (Remember that huts act as drop off points, put a hut near each mine, near thick bundles of trees, and near large packs of deer)

Economy is the most important thing early and mid game, focus on this and Infrastructure.

*Looting: Looting can either be a huge part of your economy, or not a factor at all. Orcs are very good at looting and if you choose that route you will learn more about it in the Military section. It is very smart to try to incorporate looting in your battle plans.

*Stone and Gold:

Each mine can be worked by 3 laborers at a time, but this method will cause them to run out before they can replenish, instead your going to want to put 2 laborers per mine. Use regular laborers until you manage to aquire 40 crowns, then replace all your laborers will dwarf miners, as they are the best miners (it might be cheaper if you manage to see them on the daily sale tab in the market).

*Gold: There is also the option to travel to an elven city and purchase unicorns, with the research they will provide a gold trickle. But the feature to research other races techs has not been added yet, the dev team has stated they will add this feature later (unconfirmed)

*Wood:

Wood is a little different from gold and stone, as it is not likely to run out before it replenishes unless you have 10+ laborers on this, what I'd Recommend is putting 3-5 laborers on wood chopping, and then adding in more or less as you see fit.

There is also the option to travel to an elven city and purchase wood spirits to provide a steady trickle of wood, though this route provides less then the other option stated above, it is still an option for those who love trickles.

*Food:

Food is a little different, there are many viable options here:

1: Build a warg pen and start producing wargs, then slaughter them right as they are spawned. Though there is an option to let them fatten, the amount of food they give at spawn is still higher than the cost to make them, therefore it is faster to just kill them as they spawn. Thank you toKonstantin for this information!

2: Produce 2-4 Marauders and set them to hunting, place a hut near a deer spawning site and let them work!

3: Travel to a human city (you need to ally them first, either through a siege or through a quest) and purchase 10 cows and 10 chickens, thanks to the orcs having a naturally higher population they can afford to accommodate these animals, though their food production is lower than if you were a human, making this a less viable option, but still an option if you like trickles.

4: This one is more for the long term, Each hut built provides a 0.1 trickle of food for orcs (it doesn't state this anywhere, but it's proven ingame) Therefore a long term option for food is to mass huts during the middle stages before walls are built to ensure a steady stream of food, this also allows you to use the marauders for slaughtering elfen scum.

*Work Camps: These will be your main source of resource when your homeland eventually runs dry (and it will) you're gonna want to build 2-3 of these camps, put 10 marauders in each for food, and 50 laborers, 15 set to wood, 15 set to stone, and 20 set on gold. Then make an Army of 60 Ogres (either trained, bought, or captured in Bal Ratha) and use that to ferry the resources back and forth.

Infrastructure: Do not build walls! I cannot stress this enough! wait until your economy is strong and you have atleast 1 army of lvl 15+ units and a general grasp of how to use them (see military section below)

Since Orcs are the only race (so far) that can free build, I used to believe that building huts around your walls would stop siege from reaching your walls, this has been disproven.

This and Economy go hand in hand, use your economy to build up your infrastructure and when both are strong, then proceed to military and become a war machine. First I will list All the buildings and their uses (Thanks to the wiki for the base building info):

Warg Pen - The Warg Pen breed and train Wargs. It also mounts units. Slayers and Impalers can be tasked to the Warg Pen to mount them. It breeds Wargs which can be butchered by Marauders for food. Provides +400 to resource capacity.

The Amory - The Armory researches many Orc Upgrades. When Laborers, Marauders, Slayers or Impalers are tasked to it, they will transform into the selected Siege Equipment. Provides +400 to resource capacity

Pyre - The Pyre trains Impalers. Laborers or Marauders can be tasked to the Pyre and they will trained into Impalers. Researches Infantry upgrades. Provides +100 to resource capacity.

War Hall - The War Hall allows the training of Slayers. Laborers or Marauders can be tasked to the War Hall and they will trained into Slayers. Provides +100 to resource capacity.

Temple - The Temple allows the training of Berserkers. Impalers or Slayers can be tasked to the Temple and they will trained into Berserkers. Also allows for late game wall and wall defenses via techs. Provides +400 to resource capacity.

Grand Hut - The Grand Hut is the main building of every orc stronghold. Spawns Laborers, Marauders, builds Walls upgrades and is a Resource Drop Off point.

Hut - The Hut increase population cap and acts as a resource Drop Off point. Provides +100 to resource capacity.

Orc Magic Guild - Researches spells for each of the Wizard hero's to use in combat.

1:Your going to want to start off with anywhere from 2-5 huts (then expand that as the resources become available, each hut built increases food income and maximum population, but that is only after you have a steady strong economy)

2:Then after you build the first huts, your going to want to build 10 goblin tents. Until your pretty built up goblins will be your main attacking units, and with 10 tents you'll be producing armies like its going out of style! Use these goblins to complete as many of the quests as you can! and if any of em die, so what, you can make more!

3:Next your going to want to build a war hall and then a temple next to it and then a warg pen next to that. this will allow you to quickly convert laborers into slayers and then beserkers, or straight to mounted Slayers if you choose, this pen will also supply you with wargs if you have chosen that route for food. Because you can convert faster than you can produce laborers, having multiples of these buildings isn't recommended as it is a waste of resources currently

4:Build a pyre near the slayer hut and then a warg pen next to that. Same strat as with the war hall strat above. Allows you to quickly make impalers then mounted impalers, and produce more wargs.

5:Now that you have the means to make the backbone of the orc army, it is time for siege, build 1 Armory nearby and use that to convert other units into siege, Building more than 1 is optional since siege units can be built during sieges or bought cheaply in camps or other villages. Then your Going to build 1 ogre pit, you don't need anymore because once you have a strong army you can get all the free ogres you want from Bal Ratha on the map (but more on that later) use this pit for research purposes, do not train ogres as they are expensive and it is cheaper to buy them with gold in a town (unless you are low on gold and have abundant res, in which case go for it)

6:Now that you have the means to kill everything, your going to want to complete alot of quests and Upgrade your grand hut to lvl 5 to make laborers cheaper and spawn them faster as they are the base of 90% of your army, then start researching as much as you can! research everything, it all helps you!

7:After you've gotten Fairly big, build the Orc Magic Guild! mages are insanely powerful currently, but also super expensive to acquire (80 crowns in market then spells can range you anywhere from 10-150 per spell) this is definitely a late game item, worry about it after you've built up alot .

8:Now that your Advanced enough to have built #7 Your gonna want to max your resource storage capacity, the old hard cap for orcs was 150k, though it was raised recently and I do not currently know the new hardcap. There are a few ways to do this, each different depending on your needs, you could mass huts and increase your food production as much as possible, you could build goblin tents and have the ability to make armies in minutes, or you could make warg pens.....yes warg pens! though it is not listed anywhere, these buildings increase the res cap more than the other 2 building, though they have no real use beyond that (dont try to make an army of wargs, it is expensive and not worth it). or do a combination of those, your choice really.

9:Build The guild hall, this item currently serves no real purpose but will have one in a later update, therefore it is prioritized last as it serves no use.

10: Build your walls, building your walls will mark the end of your pvp protection and you will enter into the real DoF experience, constant battles, warfare and death!

Military: orcs are hard when it comes to fighting, with stamina and strategy they are the best, and without those they are the worst, these are just the best strategies we've heard thus far.

I will cover each units use in this section, to better help you understand the available tactics, how you choose to fight with this information is up to you. For tested battle strategies used by veterens, inquire lower in the guide in the "Battle Tactics" section. Thanks to Svulnar and Shapeshifters

Now your Best bet in terms of making an Army is to make 16 of each unit (the max amount that can be selected at once) to ensure that you can handle any situation and have smooth effective control of the flow of battle.

Always bring 2-4 Marauders with you! Looting is a big part of the orc economy and will make up 1/4th of your resource influx (or more/less depending on your setup)

Slayer: These are the proclaimed "super tanks", they will be your primary tanking unit and will be the ones in the middle of the action. Your strategy for this unit will be to max resistances, then increase their damage so they can bring some pain. In combat your going to want to use the formation "Battle Stand" before they engage, this will give them 90/90/90 (pre update) and allow them to tank like champs! Alternately this will also be the units you defend your marauders with (inquire below).

Slayer Cavalry: This will be your Mainline Cavalry unit, your going to want to max their resistances and then increase damage (much like the foot soldier) these aren't the charge then run cav, these are the charge in and demolish cav, they are sturdy enough to survive in the middle of the battle while being able to dish out damage with a 2x damage against infantry passive. your going to want to put these guys in the "Serpent" Formation.

Beserkers: These are your bread and butter killing infantry, with a 3x damage to infantry passive, a Charge skill that doubles their damage, and a pretty good base damage these guys pack a wallop! For these guys your gonna want to Max resistances (see a pattern yet?) then do a 2/1 ratio between damage and hp (2 points in damage 1 in hp per level) then in combat put then into the "Battle Stand" formation and then charge the enemy and watch the bloodshed! after your initial charge pull them back and let the slayers take their place until charge comes off cooldown and then charge again.

Impalers: These are your cav/human killers, with a 3x damage passive to cav, those cav don't stand a chance. Your going to want to follow the same build as the slayer cavalry, max resistances and then do a 2/1 ratio between damage and hp and put them into the "Battle Stand" formation before you engage. Now for the human killing part! these little buggers have a neat leap skill that does alot of damage in an AoE and has a stun built in! and humans like to stand in nice, tight, small formations...see where this is going? but there are 2 strategies depending on who your leaping on. Against Light armored and medium armored enemies such as archers, crossbows, and macemen, your going to want to have your entire impaler force leap at once and preferably kill them all right there, Against heavy Armored enemies like foot knights, your going to stagger your leap attacks, have one squad leap, then another, then another, then another, etc etc. You wont wipe out heavy troops by jumping all at once, but if you stagger you can perma stun lock them and kill them before they can fight back. (told you orcs were hard)

Impaler Cavalry: These are your charge in, kill everything, and run away cavalry, these are not ment for sustained combat, these are a hit and run unit. Max out move speed and then damage, make em hit hard, then Your going to want to put these guys in the "Serpent" formation. And like i said, charge in, aim for the squishy archers and run out.

Goblin Prowlers: These archers have 1 real purpose....being the anti archers! They recieve a 2x damage against archers passive and have a naturally high pierce armor, which makes them perfect for killing archers. For these guys your gonna want to max range, then pierce armor, then damage. In combat your going to want to Stealth these guys using the "Hide", get around their foot troops and unleash arrow hell on the other guys archers! make sure you use the ability "Burning Arrows" to burn their archers and break their ranks (you have to research this at the grand hut before you can use it), Goblins have a natural fire resistance so they can stand in the flames like champs for a little while. And if the enemy sends counter troops to kill the prowlers just use the "Hide" ability and run away!

Marauders: These are your backbone archers, with a longer range than prowlers, your going to Max range, then Max damage and in battle your going to want to use the "Scorpion" Formation and hide these guys behind Slayers and use them to wittle down the enemy.

Ogres: These guys have several uses, but I currently only have one written down and that is the DPS unit killer build. Your going to max resistances, then damage, then hp. These guys have a high natural damage, large hp, good base resistances with researches, and an AoE attack! put these guys in the middle of the action and use them to take out knights, macemen, etc. These guys are weak against spearmen and archers, so try to kill off the archers and avoid the spears.

Goblin Raiders: Cheap, high numbers, and with support these little buggers can stack and be a major pain, you can build them like slayers and make mini tanks with a built-in heal and escape, or you can build them like archers and hope they do alot of damage before they die. theres several strategies with these guys . In combat your gonna want to use their "Hide" skill, sneak behind their foot soldiers and murder their squishy archers. Or Bring a Shaman with them and combine their heal skills to keep the goblins going. (Fun Fact): With max resistances and in battle stand formation, these guys have a 65/65/55 resistance spread, and a 292 atk damage (with no points in damage) this may not be the best defense, but it is better than average!

Tribal Shamans: These guys can only be bought in the market for 30 crowns, but are worth the expense. They have amazing support capabilities with an AoE heal that has a range of 520, and it should be noted that this heals more when theres more surrounding units. More units around = more healing done. But these guys also have a strong AoE damage skill with a range of 250 that should not be forgotten! these guys can turn the tide of any battle when used right, but be warned, they are very squishy and will die pretty fast if targetted, keep them in the middle of other units to avoid this. For stats your going to max stamina first to cast more spells and escape quicker, then your going to max resistances, and then life to make sure they survive!

Orc Warlord: These guys are basically the same as your starting hero, except you purchase them from the market and, like your main hero, they only lose levels when they die. For these guys your going to Max resistances, and then stamina to spam skills with. Since they share the same crown cost as the Shaman (30 crowns) it would be a better investment to just buy the Shaman.

Wargs: Receiving a 2x damage buff vs ranged and light infantry, And defense penalties vs pike infantry and cavalry, these units have a built in HP regen thanks to their fattening mechanics, and their Howl ability has recently shown that it has potential on the battlefield. The only drawbacks of this unit are its low max hp, the inability to assign skill points (as it is classified as livestock) and its laughable move speed.

Unit Abilities/Stances: (Thanks to Svulnar For this section, this really was quite a daunting task and I have nothing but respect for the effort put into finding all this data!)

Stances: First we will give you a basic run down of all the stances available to orcs, what they do, and what units have what stance.(Please Note that standing still will allow units to regen stamina faster than most stances cost, allowing you to maintain them indefinitely)

Battle Stand: All Orc units have this stance(The Maurauder unit has a slightly different variant, Inquire below for more info). 20 Stamina to activate, and then 1 stamina per second to maintain. Gives +40% Slash Resistance and +40% Crush Resistance, Provides a +40% Damage boost and Lowers Move speed by -20 points. If standing still you will regen stamina stamina faster then the 1 per second cost to maintain. Provides a heavier impact when moving.

Ranged Battle Stand: Marauders and Goblin Prowlers only. Costs 20 Stamina to activate, and then 1 Stamina per second to maintain. -30% to move speed and Provides a +40% increase to range, gives +25% pierce resistance, and +??% to damage.

Abilities: Here we will cover all of the abilities available to orc units.

Shamanic Healing: Tribal Shamans only. Costs 150 Stamina to activate with a 30 second cooldown. Heals 1500hp over the duration in a 512 range. Hits all units around and has no limit on how many units it can heal.

Blood Purge: Tribal Shamans only. Costs 120 Stamina to activate with a 40 second cooldown. Though it doesn't list damage, it has been observed to do roughly 350 damage in a 256 range.

Heal: Tribal Shamans only. Costs 90 Stamina to activate, with a cooldown of 40 seconds. Heals the Shaman for 1440 hp over the duration.

Battle Tactics: (Thanks to Svulnar for these tactics!)

Burning Legion - Requires 32 Goblin Raiders and 16 Goblin Prowlers. use hide on all units, move towards the enemies and surround them with the raiders. Unhide the raiders and make sure the enemy is Trapped inside the goblin horde, and then unhide the prowlers and use their "Fire Arrows" ability to set the enemies ablaze. Goblins have natural fire resistances and can handle standing in the fire, Activate their "Evasion" skill for added resistance. Now sit back and watch the enemy units burn alive, EXPECT CASUALTIES!

Stealth Charge - Requires 16+ Goblin Raiders, more Raiders = more damage but harder to control. Walk towards the enemy forces, do not sprint, do not stealth, and do not put them into a Formation. When your units get within melee range quickly use HIDE and sprint the Raiders past their melee units and into the center of their archers, don't attack a specific archer, just move them to the center of all the archers and then unhide and activate the "Battle Stand" Formation. When they start to take too much damage Sprint them in the opposite direction of the enemy melee and activate HIDE, make sure none of the raiders are still attacking before you use hide otherwise it will not work.

Goblin Swarm - Requires 16/32 Goblin Raiders and 16 Goblin Prowlers. Move the Prowlers infront of your Raiders so they are directly in the Enemies path, have the Prowlers use "hide". When the enemy gets close activate fire arrow and unleash hell on the enemy, when they charge the prowlers have them retreat behind the raiders and let the battle commence from there.

Goblin Ambush - Requires 32 Goblin Raiders and 16 Prowlers. Move your Prowlers behind your Raiders and put them into formation, do not use fire arrows. Predict where your enemy will attack from and position the raiders accordingly, have the raiders use "hide", do not use any formation yet. When the enemy is inside your group of Raiders, Activate "Battle Stand" and disable stealth, DO NOT target a specific unit, just turn off stealth, then Activate "Evasion". Now activate "Fire Arrows" on your prowlers and watch them die!

5/2/2014 - Added in Capacity values to buildings (thanks Brian Shingles and Wilffio for this info!) Added in Capacity Base (thanks Brian Shingles!) Added in Goblin Swarm to tactics (thanks Svulnar!) Added in Building Capacity (160?) (thanks Disgust!) Shortened Various things and removed colors to help make room for more Additions. Added in the Goblin Ambush Tactic (Thanks Svulnar!)

21/1/2014 - Shortened several sentences to ensure i don't hit the 30k letter cap. Added that Orcs now havea limited number of buildings they can build (though i don't know what the number is). Added in the Stealth Charge Tactic (Thanks Svulnar for this Tactic!). Made People Aware of the fact that the previous Res Cap of 200k+ probably isn't attainable anymore due to the limited number of buildings.

16/1/2014 - Moved the update log to help make room on the main guide. Added the Burning Legion battle tactic (thanks Svulnar!)

8/1/2014 - Made small changes to make the guide simpler and easier to read. Fixed Grammatical errors. Added in the Warg unit (thanks Svulnar!) and added in the Abilities subsection (thanks Svulnar for providing the info!)

7/1/2014 - Fixed Infrastructure typo saying mounted beserkers instead of Mounted Slayers (Thanks Svulnar), Altered color scheme to make it easier to read (Thanks Konstantin). Adjusted the Goblin Raider information to make it more helpful/accurate and Added in The Tribal Shaman, and the Orc Warlord to the unit list (Thanks Svulnar!). fixed several grammatical errors throughout the guide! (Thanks Svulnar) Added an Abilities/Stances Section (thanks Svulnar)

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"Like the unforgiving ocean, our forces will be as a tidal wave, reaving a path of destruction with nothing but ruin in their wake" - Reaver, Warchief of the Horde.

great stats guide if u could add training guide be even better
maybe building build order too for a new city
areas for new orcs to gain xp gold etc
but way better than the "wiki"
game so needs more of these guides but in a wikia and easily reached
have to disagree on the building walls though some players want fast pvp
and protection so cheap at the store building walls not an issue
end of day youll only be attacked by roughly same str army and lcl5s cheap to make and orcs don't even have that prob

A training guide is planned but for now work is in the way, I have 10 minutes to myself today and im spending it trolling around on the forums. As for the walls, i put that in to encourage the players to build up and learn before they try out pvp in this game, Orcs require alot of strategy to use correctly and most new players won't have the grasp of the game to know how to use orcs effectively. If you are making a new city however you do what you feel is best. And in regards to orc units being "cheap" that only really applies to goblins impalers and slayers, mounted units and beserkers are some of the most expensive in the game and will hurt new players ALOT to lose them. And I strongly suggest not wasting crowns on protection, it would be better to use those crowns towards researches and building upgrades.

we all have our own playstyles and this guide is nowhere near perfect. but i will take what you've said to heart and next chance i get to update the guide I'll do so with you in mind.

__________________
"Like the unforgiving ocean, our forces will be as a tidal wave, reaving a path of destruction with nothing but ruin in their wake" - Reaver, Warchief of the Horde.